High-frequency (HF) antennas relevant here and used in, for example, the automobile radar technology cited are based on the principle of capacitive coupling and have for this purpose at least two electrode surfaces, situated at a small distance from one another, which are referred to as “patches” or “patch arrays” and are usually made of copper, in whose intermediate space a dielectric having a dielectric constant εT as close as possible to the value 1 is situated.
In order that the spacing between these electrode surfaces may be maintained as precisely as possible, the dielectric material is usually made of a solid. Plastic foam films or plastic foam slabs are usually used at the same time as carriers for the electrode surfaces, since these have the desired value of εr close to 1. The patches cited are applied to both sides of the dielectric material in this case.
The foam films cited have the disadvantages that εr is not precisely 1, the films are only poorly available in the large quantities required for mass production, and are also expensive, and their ability to be processed is still little tested in mass production; in particular in the field of automobile technology.
The present invention is thus based on the object of improving a carrier system of the type cited at the beginning in such a way that the above-mentioned disadvantages of the related art are corrected or avoided.